Migration, Etc. (was Re: Wen Ho Lee Support)

Max Sawicky sawicky at epinet.org
Tue Dec 21 14:55:51 PST 1999


. . . when max talks about the labour market in the impoverished terms of supply and demand, i honestly find it a little incredible that he can. most keynsian analyses of migration and its effects on the labour market make a point of noting demand creation (even with a 'lag') . . .

mbs: If you had read my post more carefully, you would have seen that this is exactly what I said.

As for S/D, if a simple analysis serves, a more complicated one is obscurantism. Are you suggesting that immigration stimulates demand to the point where new jobs immediately appear? If not, then immigration loosens the labor market, weakens the power of labor, and I don't know what you're talking about. You talk about justification, then you offer marxian verbiage. Do you have any empirical support for the premise that immigration pushes wages up, rather than down?

There is no contradiction between opposing employers' desires re: immigration and organizing immigrant workers who are here legally. There is a problem with illegals, since the INS will use immigration restrictions prejudically at the behest of employers. I don't know how to resolve this. I do know that open borders is anarchist fantasy. I do not know why I am even talking about this, since it is not an issue in the context of WTO.

mbs



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